


Everyday Casualties

by ettie



Category: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Genre: Character Study, Drabble, Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-05
Updated: 2014-04-05
Packaged: 2018-01-18 05:14:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1416376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ettie/pseuds/ettie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A time Hikari couldn't hide behind her role.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Everyday Casualties

**Author's Note:**

> Goodness ao3, it's been a while. I can't say I'm proud of this work -- this is more of a creative exercise for me before I resume other projects and begin new ones. Yes, I'm still in love with Evangelion.

Hikari Horaki appreciated capability. It did not have to be graceful, nor did it necessitate the bravery of a shonen hero. It meant preparing her sisters’ food late at night, hushing noisy classmates into submission.

It also meant pretending the district’s emergency bells were nothing more than chuckling seagulls as she herded her classmates into the recreation center, for refuge.

“Come _on_!” Hikari shouted into the long hallway. Her voice carried over shuffling student heads, her eyes constantly darting, wary and accustomed. _That’s everyone. That’s everything. But I have to be sure!_ _  
_

Almost ready to reenter the group, she stopped abruptly as she realized something, an annoyed chill setting into her bones. The class representative narrowed her focus to a single, mischievous soul that had _not_ followed her lead.

“ _Aida._ ”

 The boy in question was leaning against the wall, holding his camera. Clearly attempting to fade from the group to dash outside, Hikari thought. To his useless death, that damn troublemaker.

 The teen lurched up, sheepish, surprised. Any sign that he felt _bad_ for ignoring her orders was nil, however.  

 “Hey Rep’, look at this.” Kensuke held his camera with limp fingers, simultaneously adjusting his glasses.

She groaned. “We don’t have time for!—“ She stopped when she realized it. The camera – expensive, an extension of his limbs – was dented at its side. Hikari’s eyes flickered to a single red wire that leapt from a crack in the device. It perturbed her. It looked as if it were crying for help, that little handheld thing.

 “Some kid knocked it from my hands.” Kensuke mourned. “All I wanted was—“

Hikari shook her head.

“Tough luck.”

She grabbed him gently, fitting her hand around his arm.

“You couldn’t use it anyway. You’d get hurt.”

“Pfft. Says you.”

A rumble shook the building. The lights flickered ominously above the teens with an eerie tremor. Hikari bit her lip.

 “Never mind. Let’s go.”

 She tugged Kensuke down the hall, his grasshopper legs spilling out after her.

“You’re harsh today,” Kensuke grumbled, resenting. His heels skid against the floor. “Slow down, will you!?”

“It’s an _emergency_.” 

Kensuke snorted. The boy pushed his bangs from his face, peering up at her sternly.

“It’s a war.”

Hikari stared at him. For some reason, she remembered her older sister. Always trying to sleep away the day because she couldn’t bear rolling out of bed to face the wasteland their part of town had turned to lately, devoid of life as everyone else moved away, fearful. Her sister would rather sleep through her death than face it head-on, and was sure the end of the world was here, though she’d survived twenty years already. Her sister had been been born with too many fragmented nerves – how could that be Kensuke’s war game?

But Hikari said nothing. She would only waste her words.

They turned a corner. Sighing, Hikari quickly realized the rest of the students were far ahead of them. Through a pair of opened red doors she saw chattering students and nearby residents sitting about a group of haphazardly placed mats. _I’m a bad example, idling like this,_ Hikari chastised herself. _At least I got everyone in time--_

Then she remembered.

“Where’s Suzuharu?” Hikari asked suddenly, her insides seizing. How could she have been so stupid, so _distracted_? “He wasn’t with you, was he?”

Kensuke raised his eyebrows. “He didn’t come in today. Think he was headed to the hospital. It’s his sister’s birthday.” He hesitated, mulling it over. “Yeah, I’m sure that’s it.”

Hikari’s heart eased, if only slightly. The hospital was at the edge of town and overlooked the ocean – a peaceful place, unlucky because the crimson tint of the water made the hospital’s walls look eerie at certain hours. Still, Toji was safer there. But the fact that he was out of her sight at all made Hikari’s mouth dry and her mind uneasy. It was the same with her sisters, and her father.

  _When had I come to value that Suzuharu so much anyway?_

“What?” Kensuke prodded. Hikari’s face flushed.

_It’s not what you think! It’s not love, it’s worry, it’s—_

“Chill. We’re not gonna die here, Rep.”

The shudder that raked the building only a moment ago jumped to an eruption. Windows crashed around them under the duress of an alien magnetism, falling cheaply around their sneakers. Hikari held her mouth to hide her shriek as she pulled Kensuke down with her, banging her back against the sidewall. She could hear screams in the gym, where the open recreation doors revealed a half-crashed room, blitzed by molten rock, as if something had shot the rooftop. The plastic doors, which had blown open from the force, were beginning to unhinge _—_ one fell across the entrance with a clatter and lay there, a kind of sacrificial lamb. Hikari’s ears rung, she could only hear Kensuke coughing through the dust that infiltrated the tight hallway.

Through the shattered windows, a floating, impossible diamond proceeded on without interruption. It was a humming blue, larger than life. Mystified, Hikari gaped as it unfolded into a series of beautiful, shining triangles, reflecting the sun.  

A shot blossomed from its center with a screech, shooting horizontal at a far-off building. Hikari snapped her eyes shut to save herself from the light of the attack. She felt the air around them growing hot, and though they had not been hit, Hikari felt stabbed, like a basketball had been thrown at her stomach.  

“Woah,” Kensuke breathed.

“Aida!” Hikari admonished. She let go, winced, looked down. A stray glass shard had cut her arm. It wasn’t deep, but there was the slight prickling of her blood that reminded her of its presence. It was nothing to worry about; she was lucky all things considered, though she thought she’d bleed out anyway. Hikari could barely keep it in most of the time: her fear, her responsibility.

Nevertheless, Hikari let go of Kensuke and eased herself off the floor, clutching her arm. She staggered to the side and crossed Kensuke’s line of vision, about to run for the gymnasium, for those injured people who needed her ability to lead, so long as she was listened to.

 “Hey!” Kensuke looked around her. “I’m gonna miss it.”

“Miss…what?” Hikari echoed.

“ _The Angel_. It can’t leave without me watching,” Kensuke explained, his eyes glittering with life. Hikari stared at him. Without a word edgewise, she stepped back, hobbling around the window shards. Far away, she heard him utter:

“Your loss.”


End file.
